Conan O'Brien says goodbye to Newt Gingrich's campaign

Last night Conan O'Brien and Andy Richter said goodbye to Newt Gingrich's ill-fated presidential campaign in the best way they know how.

Michael Fassbender plays a robot in "Prometheus" - Video goes viral

 Michael Fassbender

Irish actor Michael Fassbender plays a robot (but the humanoid kind with emotions) called David in the forthcoming sci-fi film of the summer Prometheus.

Watch him revel in the opportunity to play a man-machine. Squeel over those breathy pauses.

This is what a word class actor having fun looks like.

We reckon there's more than a little disturbing foreshadowing going on in this viral clip. How much do you want to bet he's going to malfunction?

A look at books - Irish cooking, history and fiction

Irish Traditional Cooking
By Darina Allen

Can you call yourself Irish if you don’t own at least two Irish cookery books by Darina Allen? Simply put no one else has ever assembled the classic Irish dishes with the range and scope and appreciation for Irish tradition that she has.

In Irish Traditional Cooking Allen has assembled over 300 recipes that are as wholesome and unpretentious and the books title. Allen is a seasonal cook, which means she lists dishes that are in tune with the produce on offer year round, which makes this book an especially worthwhile purchase for discerning cooks.

This is magical food, prepared and presented in simple step-by-step measures that won’t intimidate. It’s made simple because Allen’s knowledge is authoritative, and she knows Irish cuisine inside out.

What’s especially fascinating is her knowledge not just of the recipes but also of the Irish cooking and baking traditions that produced them and her passion to preserve them is infectious.

Food can be a powerful gateway into the past and Allen knows this, and her chapter on making Barm Brack will probably take you back to your own childhood days in Ireland if you were lucky enough to experience it. If you weren’t this book is as close as you are ever likely to come. It can not be recommended highly enough.

Kyle Books, $35.00

Pure Cork
By Michael Lenihane

The garb changes from generation to generation, but the faces in the photographs in Michael Lenihane’s new book clearly belong to our tribe. From its origins as a medieval walled town to its status now as one of the top ten cities on the Lonely Planet’s Guide, Lenihane’s book Pure Cork traces the illustrious history of this mold-breaking city and the vivid people who make their homes there.

In a way never seen before Lenihane’s new book visually captures the city’s rapid evolution through a series of judiciously chosen photographs, post cards, maps, sketches and drawings, bringing to life the sights and sounds of the of the rebel city in the process.

Two hundred years of Irish history is contained within its pages and it’ll be a gift best appreciated by those who know what it means to be pure Cork, boy!

Dufour, $39.95.

Sharp Sticks, Driven Nails
Edited by Phillip O’Ceallaigh

The Irish are the world’s acknowledged masters of the short story form. In this punchy new collection from the innovative Irish publishing group The Stinging Fly Press we’re introduced to a new generation of Irish writers, this time edited by the award winning short story writer Phillip O’Ceallaigh.

This is a discerning new collection of emerging and established Irish voices that at times achieves startling originality and surprise with tales that involve murder, mayhem, love, confrontation and even sedate pastimes like taking Italian lessons taking unexpected turns.

The Irish short story form (and its writers) are looking further than the four green fields to Europe and in acknowledgement the editor has for the first time included European writers in the mix, adding an extra dimension to the already rich layers of metaphor and cultural exchange that already underscore the Irish experience.

Dufour, $21.95.

Citizen Dwyer
By Sean McCarthy

Authors often have to issue a caveat when it come to writing about Irish history, as if to explain the at times blatantly contradictory attitudes of the people themselves. This is as it should be. Everything is always being contested in Ireland; from the name of a child to the boundary of a property, you can be certain that someone somewhere is going to take a different view, and most likely at the worst possible moment.

Meet Wicklow Chieftain Michael Dwyer, the hero of McCarthy’s novel. Composed of delightfully contrasting characteristics, he’s a revolutionary idealist, and inspirational guerilla leader and a violent alcoholic. Hey, you have to take the bad with the good, after all.

In McCarthy’s sprawling new tale we follow McCarthy and his family as they are deported to a penal colony in Australia. In case you’re wondering it’s a fictional tale based on real characters, and it tells a sobering tale about the ravages of an uncontrollable addiction. Booze can make a meal of even the most accomplished men and so it proves in McCarthy’s moral fable.

Dufour, $27.95

Looks at Books - New books reviewed for your consideration

Fighting Tuesdays
Edited By Emily Firetog and Declan Meade

FOURTH year, or transition year as its also known, is the much beloved year bookended by two fearful exams in the Irish school system. For students it’s the year when you can relax a bit and begin to discover your teenage identity finally. If you’re lucky it’ll be one of the happiest of your life too.
In Fighting Tuesdays the Stinging Fly Press invited students in that age bracket to submit original short stories, 24 of which have been selected for this book.
What makes this one worth your time is the remarkable sophistication in evidence in these pages. These stories aren’t just powerful; they’re a timely portrait of modern Ireland.
Spanning the great themes of friendship, love, bullying, drugs, alcohol, football and finding yourself, the humor and the dialogue crackle with the fierce urgency of youth itself.
Dufour, $15.95.

Setting the Truth On Fire: The Inside Story of the Bloody Sunday Campaign
By Julieann Campbell

IT took 18 years and 28 families to uncover the truth of what happened on Bloody Sunday, that lamentable day that changed the course of history in the North, but the sheer injustice of those 14 shocking killings would provide their inspiration in years to come.
United by their grief and outrage over the killings these families, who were in the beginning mostly strangers to each other, met and started a campaign for a new investigation into the shootings and for the exoneration of the victims.
Derry woman Julieann Campbell is the niece of the youngest victim, Jackie Duddy. A journalist and award winning poet, she was press officer for the Bloody Sunday families and saw their struggle from the inside, resulting in one of the most illuminating portraits of the campaign yet written.
It took almost two decades, but that determined campaign ended with Lord Saville’s historic report that found the British Army’s actions on the day “unjustified” and “unjustifiable.” Campbell’s book is a testament to their unflagging courage, but it reminds us too that what motivated them most was love.
Dufour, $24.95.

The Chosen
By Arlene Hunt

Irish writer Arlene Hunt makes the business of crafting a terrific new thriller look easy. Her latest introduces us to Jessie Conway, a hard working teacher at a local high school who unwittingly becomes the target of a serial killer.
Brilliantly crafted from the beginning, Hunt makes her heroine likeable and tough, which makes what happens next all the more involving. Psychotic killers are no match for the power of love and hope and so Hunt sets the stage for a showdown that is as riveting as it is believable.
There’s a cinematic sweep to Hunt’s work that suggests a bidding war may be in her future, but in the meantime you should acquaint yourself with one of the most interesting new voices to have emerged in thrillers in recent years.
Dufour, $21.95.

Just Follow the Floodlights: The Complete Guide to League of Ireland Football
By Brian Kennedy

IN 1921 the Irish weren’t just founding the Republic they were founding a national football team. Ninety-one years on that league is still going strong.
Forty-seven teams have comprised the League, and each has produced its own storied history. Ireland has always produced a surplus of eccentric characters, local color and victories against all the odds and this handsomely illustrated book is a time capsule that brings the fondest hopes of generations of players and fans back to life.
Dufour, $29.95.

1798: Tomorrow The Barrow’s We’ll Cross
By Joe Murphy

WHAT could be more Irish than the tale of a family shattered by divided loyalties? In this case it’s the tragic generation of 1798 when that all out and disastrous rebellion tears at the national fabric, with consequences that will be felt for centuries.
Joe Murphy’s enthusiasm for the period and for the men and women who lived and died during it leaps off every page of his new novel, a swashbuckling romance filled with last stands and epic battles.
Tragically the fight against the rapidly growing British Empire is as nothing against the internal squabbles that erupt between the United Irishmen and the Loyalists and Murphy reminds us that the enemies within are often the bitterest we will ever encounter.
Dufour, $22.95.